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laughroditee · 1 month ago

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🟡 "Hither, Hither / Do Not Come Near"

Hither, hither, love! Let us feed and feed! –John Keats, “Hither, Hither, Love”

Characters: cryptid!König, gender neutral!reader Location: a (fictional) mountain with forest and caves in Austria. Inspired by the "lamp eyes" in this (second) image by toxooz CW: you are being hunted, pissing (non-kinky) as intimidation, luring, fear, anxiety, dread, inaccurate battery drainage, inaccurate forestry regulations (don’t leave your fire burning while you sleep), inaccurate camping regulations for Austria (basically don't do anything Reader does), profanity Word Count: 2276 AO3 link Mood Music:

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The sunlight filters through the trees as you hike the trail up the mountain, taking in all the natural beauty that Austria has to offer. The rich, woodsy scents of earth, spruce, and pine surround you, the evergreen needles muffling your footfalls as you walk. Green carpets of rolling grass are dotted with blue and purple, yellow and white, and even little trumpets lining the trail to herald your arrival.

It’s like The Sound of Fucking Music over here, the sheer splendor of your surroundings making you feel like you made the best decision of your life to do this hike. You'd researched what trail to pick and what to take with you. You’d planned on this for months, and honestly, you couldn't have picked a better day for it: three days, two nights, just you and Mother Nature. Everything was perfect.

Pulling out your instant film camera, you take a selfie to remember this perfect day by. Maybe you'll even take selfies all the way up the mountain just to document your journey. You had enough film packs for it, and this felt like the kind of thing that needed documentation, so why not?

You pose and aim the camera at yourself, looking in the little mirror attachment you'd bought for this purpose, and take your picture, the flash going off in your face. The camera's motor whirs as it spits out your first instant exposure, and after collecting it, you continue on your hike.

You repeat this pattern every half hour or so or any time you find something particularly interesting or lovely, stopping to take pictures and/or selfies and reloading your camera's film pack every ten exposures. Soon enough, you notice the sky changing colors and decide you’d be wise to find a good place to make camp for the night.

Under a small copse of trees, you set up your tent on a bed of pine needles, driving the tent spikes into the ground with a stone you find at the site. After building a small fire a safe distance from your tent and any trees, you start cooking your dinner, taking out your instant camera and the stack of photos from your hike.

You take one more selfie before you lose the light completely, snapping the picture with a blinding flash that leaves you blinking. You take your newest photo and lay it on your knee, leaning over to stir your dinner in the pot as it's heating, waiting for the shot to develop.

After collecting your dinner, you look at the developing selfie and notice something strange in the background: two bright dots to the right of your head set in a swath of darkness. You squint, rubbing the exposure with your thumb despite knowing you’re not supposed to touch it. Maybe something was wrong with it, something on the exposure itself that kept the light from hitting the paper in those spots, resulting in blank areas.

As the photo develops further and the image takes form, you look closer at those two bright dots — a yellow-green now — and your first thought is that they are very much like eyes, staring at you from the shadows of the forest.

A chill runs through you. You turn, sweeping the trail with your flashlight, but you see nothing, just bushes and trees; hear nothing but crickets and other small creatures. Your flashlight flickers slightly, and you turn back to your dinner and your warm, cozy fire, unable to get quite as cozy as you were a moment ago.

How absurd. It was probably nothing; just a weird fluke. You continue your meal and look through the stack of photos from the day, carding through pictures of beautiful landscapes and flowers, stopping when you come to your next-most-recent selfie. You’d found a few edible berries on the trail and decided to take a picture of yourself, your mouth stained red by their juices.

You’re about to move on to the next photo when you see them: those two dots — those eyes — in the shadows again, further away than in your most recent selfie.

Your heart stutters. What is this?

As you arrange your pictures chronologically, you are struck by a chilling discovery. In each selfie, two bright lights — two glowing eyes — can be seen somewhere in the background behind you, hidden in a large, dark shape or the shadows of the trees. You card through the photos, heart beating hard, thumb sliding over each one frantically, and they're there in each one, down to your first at the base of the mountain, watching. Following. Getting closer and closer to you each time you take a selfie.

It's probably just an animal. A bear or something, judging by how tall it seems as it peeks around trees and through the thick brush. Its form is never clear, just a silhouette with those bright eyes looming in the darkness, staring at you.

You shiver.

Well, if it is an animal, you should probably keep the fire going to drive it away tonight. Granted, you know you shouldn't leave the fire burning all night unattended, but the idea of being left in the dark makes your skin crawl, and everyone knows animals hate light, right? Remember our ancestors, the cavemen? Yeah. Just an animal. It'll be fine.

So you throw some more logs on the fire, wash your dishes, and bury the water in a hole you dug to cover the smell of food. Then you get into your tent, zipping it up all the way. So much for a fresh breeze, but at least in this shelter, you feel some sort of safety, some separation between you and the unknown.

Your flashlight still flickers, and you decide to change the batteries now instead of later because you intend to leave it on all night. Not that you're scared or anything; it's just that extra light means extra animal deterrent, right? That's how that works, right?

Sleep does not come easily, and you toss and turn in your sleeping bag, eyes jolting open at the slightest sound of nature outside (which, surprisingly, is everywhere — why did you think this was a good idea?).

It isn't until just after midnight that you hear it: a whistle. You try to convince yourself that it's only something that sounds like a whistle, like the wind or a bird, and you nearly make your case until the next one sounds with a little bend in it. A little wheee-oooo in the pitch black of the forest, as if someone were pursing their lips, beckoning, just for you.

You hate it. Instantly, your heart pounds, your ears straining for voices or footsteps; maybe it's another camper hiking this trail, too, and needs shelter. But if that were the case, did they have to be so fucking creepy about it? You try to control your breathing, listening for anything other than the creak of the trees above you, but still, you hear nothing. It isn't until the sky starts to turn grey that you feel safe enough to sleep; dawn is on its way.

When morning arrives – too quickly – you're more than happy to get up and break down your camp despite your lack of sleep, deciding that you'll eat your breakfast on the trail instead of at a leisurely pace like you'd planned. No. The time for leisure has gone. Judging by the map, you are now closer to the exit of the trail than you are to the entrance, so you decide, uneasily, to keep going forward.

As you hike, you don't dare waste time with selfies; you're too scared you’ll find more of those glowing yellow-green eyes in the background. Or worse, find the owner of said eyes. Thinking back to your childhood cat, you know a lot of animals have eyeshine, which helps them to see better in the dark. They reflect light and make it look like the eyes glow or some shit, especially in photos, making them look like little demons. You recall that many predators seem to have them and then quickly wipe that little factoid from your mind.

You busy yourself with nature facts for a while, reciting aloud the names of the plants and forageable berries you see along the way. By the time you find your next spot for camp, you are completely exhausted, not only from the hike or your poor sleep the night before but from the anxiety of constantly looking over your shoulder.

Instead of pitching your tent right away, you spend most of the time before sunset looking for firewood and building an even bigger fire than the night before. No whistling bears or campers or whatever the fuck were going to come near your tent tonight.

The fire blazes hot and high as you sit before it, huddled in a blanket with your flashlight and cup of dried food — no smells of cooking tonight to lure hungry animals or hikers, for that matter.

Immediately, your mind goes back to the whistle, its testing, beckoning nature making the inside of your skull itch with unease. Maybe it was one of those birds that mimic human sounds that happened to be around at night. Surely, there were birds like that, right? It's probably a bunch of things together and not just one thing. Just a coincidence. That's the only conclusion you can come to. Because the alternative — the one that claws at the inside of your head and tells you that something, or someone, is out there — that just can't be.

After dinner, you stoke the fire, load it up with a couple more logs, and retreat to your tent, burrowing into the sleeping bag with your flashlight propped up in the center to illuminate your sleeping area. Exhausted from the lack of sleep the night before, you drift off thankfully quickly, only to be awakened sometime later.

The night seems hauntingly quiet, as if nature itself senses something is wrong. Leaves rustle from a distance away, and you hear the movement of a creature outside, the fire and your flimsy fabric shelter the only things between it and you. Your flashlight, stalwart watchman of the tent, starts to flicker, the set of batteries you'd put in it reaching the end of their lifespan, and that's when you hear it.

Wheee-oooo.

Your heart stops at the sound of the whistle, and you hold your breath, hoping that if you’re just quiet enough, just pretend that you’re sleeping, that whatever — whoever it is will just go away and leave you alone.

Thud, thud, thud, thud….

Are those footsteps?

The sound comes closer, twigs snapping under the weight of this person, this creature, and you scramble for your flashlight, slapping it, begging the light to stay on, to stay steady. A third thwack, and it's clear that your attempts at resuscitation are failing, and the batteries finally die, leaving you and your tent protected only by the dancing light of the fire outside. You curse under your breath, diving for your old set of batteries that you’d removed yesterday. Screwing off the top of your flashlight, you fling the dead batteries out and, with shaky hands, slide the old batteries in as, in the background, you hear the sound of water pouring and a sudden hissing.

This gives you enough pause to look at the silhouettes projected on the fabric of your tent: at how the flames of your fire — your precious sentinel — quiver, cower, and die.

The smell hits you then, the stench alerting you to the fact that this was not water putting out your fire, but in fact, someone was pissing on it to put it out. The heavy, acrid smell of boiling urine invades your nostrils, making you gag.

You refocus your efforts on threading the cap of your flashlight back on the barrel, your shaking, frantic hands making the threads skip until marvelously, mercifully, you screw the cap on, and the flashlight flickers to life just as your fire dies.

The growl that sounds from outside and the heavy thud-thud of footfalls that draw closer to your tent sound much closer to something human than animal, and you have to wonder who in the world you managed to piss off to make them stalk you so far up a mountain and into the woods at this hour of the night.

Suddenly, the tent lurches, and you scream as whoever is outside rips the stakes from the ground and yanks the entire thing toward them. You are engulfed in a polyester death shroud, scrambling for your pack and waving your flashlight around blindly.

You need your knife — anything to protect yourself at this point, but as the creature rips the tent open like it was made of paper, all you can grab is your camera. You point it at him and press the button, the flash lighting up the night like an atom bomb, and he snarls, stumbling back, blinded.

A split second is all you get to see him. The man is bigger than any person you've ever seen in your life, dressed in black and wearing a black cloth over his head.

You run. You don't have time to look for shoes. You don't have time to look for your knife. You just clutch your camera and run, hoping that you can find a place to hide.

They don't tell you that the forest floor is not good for running barefoot on. They don't tell you how modern human feet just aren't made for it anymore. But you know from all the twigs and branches cutting into the soles of your feet that you are fighting a losing battle. That you are prey and your hunter is going to get you.

You can hear him running after you, those heavy footfalls sounding like the thunder of ten thousand angry gods, and despite your head start, you know he'll catch up to you on those long legs of his.

When you spot a cave, your prehistoric animal brain cries, "safe!", "home!" and like a fool, you listen, running inside, losing all light as you slip into the pitch black of Mother Earth.

Feeling blindly for the wall, you move slowly and hear him enter the cave, a low growl sounding out like echolocation.

You know he hates the light. Your camera has nine exposures left. A sound to your left has you pointing the camera in that direction and pressing the button. Light floods the cave, burning its landscape into your retinas, his dark shape a retreating blur.

Eight.

You have to find the way back out. Coming in here was a bad idea. He clearly has an advantage over you, being able to see in the dark. You’ll have to burn through your exposures to get back out. Gravel grates to your right, and you take another picture, blinding both him and yourself, the exposure falling uselessly to the cave floor. Absently, you wonder if people will ever find them.

Seven.

Will people even find your body?

Light blazes through the cave again, and you can move toward the exit, cursing as pain lances into your sole from stepping on a sharp rock.

Six.

You can tell you're bleeding from how the dirt sticks to your foot and from the snarl you hear behind you: the predator scenting his prey. The next flash exposes his dark shape behind a stalagmite, and you rush in the opposite direction.

Five.

The click of the shutter echoes in the cave as the camera flashes again, your brain trying to memorize the location of obstacles.

Four.

His roar reverberates in the cave, shaking the very air around you and has you screaming, snapping your camera beside you.

Three.

You hear him stumble in frustration and are convinced you actually got him good that time, and you snap again for good measure.

Two.

You move faster toward the exit. You can actually see the outside world now, so close, but still so far. You blow an exposure behind you to stall him further.

One.

A breeze from outside blows across the cave mouth, and you can almost taste it if not for the wall you just ran into.

Zero.

Only it’s not a wall.

His reflective eyes blaze as he looks down at you. The hood-like structure on his face parts down the middle like a pair of bat wings, the exposed red maw lined with dozens of razor-sharp teeth. His jaw opens far wider than anything you've ever seen or ever will, and then your light goes out.

author's note- this was on loop as I was writing:

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cosmicwhoreo · 1 year ago

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A lil' hiccup in engineering

CONTENT WARNING Some blood

Gold Choco is an infamous weapons-smith and dealer who's been in business for a LONG time... Some more superstitious cookies even argue he's been around since the Victorian era.

But obviously, those are just silly tall tales made to add further fear and mystery to the cookie's name... Such a feat of longevity would require either a Soul Jam or some crude alternative to one.

#Gold Choco Cookie #cw: blood #cookie run kingdom #cookie run #crk #doodle comic #fan cookie #OC cookie #Yes he is a sort of steampunk-esc cyborg #with all sorts of little problems he has to remedy every now and then #It's not exactly something he wants known as he likes his aura of mystery and intimidation #knowledge of his “condition” would lose him that...

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starry-bi-sky · 1 year ago

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Childhood Friends Au: Danny's in Gotham Again

when the wool is off your eyes you'll stop counting sheep at night cause you'll eat your fill of them during the daytime

A few weeks after Danny’s visit to Gotham, he buys an apartment in the city. It’s this little thing, a studio apartment on the same street he grew up in. In Crime Alley. When he tells his parents, they protest heavily. They don’t think it's safe. They think he should reconsider. There were plenty of apartments and places to live somewhere else. And what about college?

Danny doesn’t think he’ll go to college. He isn’t sure what he wants to do, now that being an astronaut is off the table. It’d be a waste of money to go without a goal in mind, he thinks. He says he’ll take a gap year and apply at one of the community colleges funded by the Wayne Corporation, possibly. It just wasn’t in the cards right now.

“If things get tough,” He says at dinner that night, “then I can talk to the Waynes. I’m friends with the family, remember?” He ended up getting Bruce’s number in his phone again before he left, and in the process got Tim’s as well. They don’t talk much, Danny isn’t sure what to say. But he sends Tim memes whenever he comes across one and thinks he’ll like. Tim sends memes back in return.

His parents do remember. They remember. They also remember the horrified shriek that echoed through the house when Danny learned of Jason’s passing. They remember running up the stairs and bursting into their son’s room and finding him sobbing into his bed, curled up like a little kid, like he was in pain. He lost his voice that day, stuck between screaming out his grief and sobbing it.

They’re still not sure if they should let him go.

In the end, Danny wins them out, and he lets them help him search for an apartment. They take a break from their lab work to help search for cheap furniture to buy. They may have more money than when they were in Gotham, but that frugal part of you never fully goes away. They all agree that they don’t want Danny to be seen carrying in nice-looking furniture when he moves in.

He ends up with a basic furniture set, all mismatched, and in the warm summer of June, his parents rent out a u-haul and drive him down to Gotham to move in. They meet the landlord when they arrive, a skinny and frail old man with wispy white hair and a wrinkled face. He gives Danny the keys and tells him what apartment number he is, and then he leaves.

His parents help him move in. They help him carry his heavy furniture up to the second floor, where his apartment is. Danny isn’t sure if he wants them to help. His mom and dad are strong, but they are getting old, closer to their fifties now that their children are grown. His dad’s hair is slowly beginning to thin, and rather than the white eating at the sides of his head, it now streaks through his hair like salt-and-pepper. His mom’s hair is graying out too, and there are more lines in their faces than he remembers there being.

When he voices his concerns, his mom laughs spiritedly and says that they may be getting old, but they are still as spry as when they were in their twenties. Danny isn’t sure if he believes them or not. He can see his dad struggle a bit when they return to get his bed frame, and they have to take a break before they go back down for the rest of their things.

Five years ago, his dad could do this without breaking a sweat. It forces a heavy thing in the back of Danny’s throat. (He is less afraid of his own death than he is of his loved ones, and while he has always felt rocky with his parents, he still loves them more than anything else.)

Danny’s apartment is exactly as he would have expected it to be: shabby and worn through. The entire room smells like stale cigarette smoke and weed, nicotine stains the wall with poorly covered bullet holes, and stains in the carpet that are a color he can’t discern. The fridge has a broken light and when he tries to turn on the gas stove, it click-click-clicks before lighting, fire fwooshing out while the smell of gas fills the air. There’s rat droppings in the cupboards and the closet-like bathroom is just as bad.

The ghostly part of him can sense the heavy stench of death in the room; people have died in this room. People have died in every room of this building, he thinks. They have died on the streets outside and in the alleys squeezed between them. He can feel it like a heavy fog in the air.

It is painfully nostalgic, a bittersweet feeling in his chest that he grimaces to.

When the last box is placed in his apartment, his parents offer to help unpack. They are hesitant to leave and Danny knows it, although he doesn’t know if it’s from empty nest syndrome or because it's Gotham. He thinks it might be both. He is their youngest child finally leaving home to a city known for its danger.

“Are you sure you don’t want us to stay behind, sweetie?” His mother asks, a frown she tries to hide settled in the creases of her face. She fiddles with her hands, a nervous habit Danny has since noticed when she feels truly unsure and doesn’t need to hide it. Hesitancy looms over her like a heavy cloud.

His dad jumps in hastily, splaying his hands and smiling painfully wide to hide the glistening in his eyes. “You’re mother’s right! We can help you get everything set up, champ. I could probably do something with that stove of yours to make it faster!” He says, his voice still booming like it always does even if there’s a stumble in his words.

It makes his heart squeeze, knowing just how much they care. It was hard last summer, telling him that he was the Phantom. Terrifying, actually. They couldn’t comprehend it. He hadn’t felt his heart beat that fast in years when he stood in front of them at the kitchen table and told them he was a halfa, begging them to believe that ghosts weren’t inherently evil.

His parents were people of science, however, and after much, much shock, they slowly came to terms with it. How could they not? The evidence was right in front of them. Their son was dead-alive, alive-dead. Somewhere stuck in the between. The tears they shed that night could fill a river, moving from the kitchen to the living room as Danny explains how he died.

(When Danny tells them that he died after a week Jason did, his mom and dad look horrified. His mom covers her mouth when he adds that it was his idea to go inside it, his dad looks ashy pale, gripping his pant legs so tight that his knuckles turn white. There is a conclusion coming to their minds that he can tell they don’t like.)

(“You’ve always hated our inventions, Danny.�� Mom says in a hushed voice, and Danny winces at the wording, sinking into the back of the cushions in shame. He never thought that his parents noticed. Mom quickly grabs his arm, “No, no, there’s nothing to be ashamed of Danny. We were… perhaps too careless with our inventions, too enthusiastic. You had every right to hate the things we made when they had a tendency to… to malfunction.”)

(Malfunction is a delicate way of putting it, when Danny remembers every time they had to evacuate their old apartment complex because whatever half-baked creation his parents made inevitably blew up into ash and smoke. There were soot marks permanently stained into the ceiling.)

(Her hand slides down and grabs his, and she cups it in both of her hands, squeezing tightly. He forces himself to look up, and there is a look like her heart breaking when he looks into his mother’s eyes. “You’ve always avoided the lab after we moved, Danny. And you had every right to, so why on Earth did you ever think about going into the portal?”)

(Danny struggles to come up with an adequate answer, a way to verbalize what came over him that day five years ago. The answer is there, hanging in the air like a knot in a noose. He opens his mouth, and then closes it.)

(Finally, with a tongue made of lead, he shrugs lamely and looks away. “I didn’t know there was an on button inside it.” He mumbles, and despite being the truth it feels like a lie. But that is the truth. He didn’t know there was an on button inside it. So he didn’t care what happened.)

(Something dulls in mom’s eyes, like she thought of something else that Danny hadn’t said. Her eyes shimmer, and she squeezes them shut, breathing in so deep that it shakes. And then she pulls him into a hug, a hand burying into his hair and pressing him close. “It must have hurt so much, sweetheart. I’m so sorry.”)

(It is something that Danny doesn’t expect her to say, like missing the last step of the stairs. It startles him so much he laughs this short, bark of a thing. He feels his dad press against his back and wrap his big arms around them, his nose pushed into his hair.)

(Because yeah. Yeah, it did hurt. It hurt more than anything else he’s ever felt before. It had torn him apart and sewn him back together again, only to rinse and repeat. The pain was nothing he ever spoke to Sam or Tucker about, and it was something they never brought up. No, that’s not true. If they ever brought it up, Tucker would call it a zap. As if Danny only experienced a mild static shock. Like it was painless. It’s a pretty lie that Danny lets him and Sam believe.)

(His eyes sting and water immediately wobbles into his vision, coming up with such a force that he doesn’t even need to blink before it spills over. “Yeah.” He forces out, voice unexpectedly rough and cracking. “Yeah, it- it hurt. A lot.”)

He tells them about fighting the Lunch Lady a month later. He tells them about finding Jason. It comes spilling out like a waterfall. “I found him, mom.” He says, holding onto her tight while she keeps him tucked under his chin like a little kid. The secret of Jason being Robin stays hidden under his tongue, it is not his secret to tell. Not his identity to expose. He grips her tighter. “I found him, mom. Right there in the Ghost Zone, and he was my Jason. He wasn’t an echo or a— an imprint of him.”

Mom is silent; quiet and attentive, and so is dad, who rubs his large hands up and down Danny’s spine in an attempt to soothe him. It only works a little. Danny breathes in like a gasp as the urge to cry overcomes him again. He always avoids talking about Jason, his grief is like a never-healing scab that can be picked off at any time. It is ingrained into his core.

“And then I lost him.” He forces out, a sob layering under his words that he chokes on and swallows. The hand on his back stills, and he can feel mom and dad breathe in like a question. He turns his head and pushes it into mom’s shoulder. “He disappeared, mom. Just— just gone.”

“And he didn’t move on.” He says, voice snarling like teeth biting before his mom can ask, because he knows that’s what she was going to ask. It’s what Sam and Tucker asked when he came to them in tears hours after he found Jason gone. It’s what Jazz said when he finally told her about it. It’s what every one of his ghosts asked when he told them about it and begged for their help.

Danny grits his teeth and tries not to dig his nails into mom’s clothes as a fresh wave of tears run down his face. “His haunt is still there. If Jason really moved on it would have disappeared with him. That’s how it works. But it’s still in the zone, so Jason’s out there I just don’t know where.”

(Sam once asks him why Danny didn’t just move on from it a year after Jason’s disappearance. She asked him why he didn’t give it up. Danny nearly saw red, and nearly bit her head off for it. It was incomprehensible to him to just stop looking for Jason, to give up. Not when he was out in the zone somewhere. Because he had to be in the zone.)

(Danny once tried to take Jason through the portal with him, and much like what happened to Kitty, it didn’t work. Jason was too tied to the ghost zone to leave.)

(Some bonds are just unbreakable, he thinks. Bonds forged through blood and time and trust, and when you’re on the streets of Gotham, you hoard what little trust you have in someone like a dragon with its gold. It is scarcely given and fiercely kept.)

“I’ve been looking for him.” Danny whispers when talking becomes too hard for him, when it runs the risk of him crying. “When- when I’m not fighting ghosts or, or in school or with my friends, I’ve been looking for him.” He has explored the Ghost Zone in every reach he can. He has met so many people. He’s met the ghosts of aliens from planets in every corner of the galaxy. He has met gods or god-like beings and their disciples.

He’s met famous scholars and writers (he’s gotten the autographs of all of Jason’s favorite writers). He has found entire cities that have so much life in it that it's been permanently etched into the ghost zone, like a mirror version of itself.

He’s visited the ghostly vision of Gotham so many times, and he avoids the imprint of Wayne Manor like the plague. There are ghostly newspapers that he reads. There are the ghosts of Martha and Thomas Wayne in many of them.

Jason’s haunt connects to Wayne Manor, but it is also the street they grew up in. It is a small brick building with a door that leads to Jason’s room. A ghost knows when someone enters their haunt, it alerts them like a doorbell in the back of their mind. A foreign ecto-signature in a place drenched in your own.

Danny visits it every time he goes into the Ghost Zone. It’s always his first stop.

He tells his parents all of it. He tells them of the ghosts he’s met, of the places he’s seen. And when he feels brave, he tells them about Rath and the terror that his future self brings him. He keeps some details hidden, the ones that he can afford to keep without muddling up the story.

(Rath is a tall, spindly thing, like a funhouse mirror version of Danny himself. He has arms that are much too long and legs that are much too tall, with skinny fingers that extend into claws.He wears his suit the same as Danny does, with it partially undone and the sleeves wrapped around his waist.)

(There is a black hole in his chest that is much bigger than Danny’s own. It takes up his chest cavity and drips the same, viscous black liquid as the tears falling from his eyes. Danny never forgets his voice; a scraping, quiet thing like he’s screamed himself hoarse. Rath has a voice like goosebumps, and it haunts Danny like a bump in the night.)

Danny speaks and speaks and speaks until he can’t think of anything else to speak of. He is tired and sad, and it feels like his heart has been ripped out and rubbed raw again. And yet, he also feels so much better. Like a long heavy weight has been taken off his chest.

Yeah, last summer was hard. His parents walked on eggshells around him, and they forced themselves to unlearn their bias of ghosts. It was more than Danny could have ever dreamed of, and when they felt ready for it, they asked him more about the ghost zone.

He smiles sadly at his dad, “I think fixing the stove can be a priority another time, dad.” He says, watching him wilt and his smile fall. Jack Fenton was always so good at making himself look like a kicked puppy. “I can handle unpacking by myself, I promise.”

His parents still look so unsure, like they want to argue. Danny watches his mom purse her lips tightly, confliction running across her face like a datastream. She takes dad’s hand, squeezing their fingers together despite the droop in her shoulders.

“Oh, alright then, I suppose.” She relents, her hand placing on Jack’s arm. “I guess we could go, we’re just going to miss you so much, Danny.”

Tears seem to have won over his dad, and Jack Fenton sniffs back before he can cry properly. “Our little boy, all grown up.” He says, voice wobbling. It makes Danny laugh, and it makes his heart pang. His smile grows impossibly wider and so much fonder. “You’ve become such a kind, wonderful young man, Danno. We’re so proud of you.”

Danny laughs again, and it cracks. “You’re gonna make me cry, dad.” (He feels a welling of guilt in his gut that he ignores — he doesn’t feel like a kind man. He doesn’t feel like a good one either. Not with what he plans to do.)

His father holds out his arms in hopefulness, “One last hug for your old man before we head out?” He asks, mustering up a smile on his face.

Danny barrels into him, nearly knocking his dad over with an oomph. He’s as tall as him now, but he still feels little in his bear hugs. With arms wrapping around his middle, Danny hugs his father tight and breathes him in one last time.

“Careful there, Danno.” He laughs, patting Danny’s back roughly. “You’ll break my ribs with that ghostly strength of yours!” But he holds on just as tight.

Out of spite, Danny bends back and lifts him off his feet, laughing when Jack tenses up and nearly scrambles out of surprise. His mom laughs with him, stepping back to give them room for the few seconds that dad is in the air.

When it’s his mom’s turn, Danny has to hunch to hug her. Something bittersweet to him as she plants a kiss on his forehead and says that he’ll always be her baby. “Even if you do have that horrid smoking habit.” She adds on with a disapproving eyebrow raise.

Danny turns red in embarrassment, and walks them back to the GAV. Gothamites of all kinds slow to stop and boggle at the monstrous, road-illegal thing that is parallel-parked next to the curbside. In the past, Danny would have died with mortification to be seen with it. Now it just makes him laugh. Before he goes back into the apartment building, he buys a newspaper from a nearby convenience store.

The first thing he does when he gets back up to his room is one: make a mental note to buy a bicycle chain lock for the door. The locks jiggle and there are splinters along the side that show signs of it being broken into in the past. The second thing he does is pull his cigarettes out of his pocket and light one.

Danny starts to unpack with a cigarette hanging from his mouth, placing the newspaper he bought onto the counter. He has a cheap loveseat that he pushes off to the side, and he moves the boxes into the kitchen. It’s a matter of organization that Danny has to think about before he does anything.

It’s as he’s pushing the sofa up against the wall facing the windows that his phone rings a familiar tune: Sam. The phone is fished out before he can think about it and when he stares down at the screen, he realizes it's a facetime call.

He presses answer and walks over to prop his phone up onto the counter. The smiling faces of Sam and Tucker greet him, rather than just Sam. Immediately, Danny grins. “Hey Danny.” Sam greets, smiling a dark-painted lazy thing. From the background it looks like they’re in Tucker’s room. Sam is in Tucker’s desk chair, and Tucker is behind her, leaning against it. “Have you moved in yet?”

Danny pulls the cigarette from his mouth and huffs, a cloud of smoke following his breath. “Yeah! It’s a shithole.” He grins lopsidedly, and his feet carry him off to the side to allow Sam and Tucker view of his apartment. He lets thirty seconds pass, allowing the both of them to really see the rest of the room. And then he steps back into frame.

Sam and Tucker both look like they’re trying not to look judgemental, like they’re trying to hide a grimace that Danny sees anyway with the small turns at the corner of their mouths. He grins wider, mirth filling his lungs. “I know, it looks awful doesn’t it?”

“It’s— it’s not so bad.” Sam says with a strain in her voice, a forced smile on her face that tries to be reassuring. Tucker nods along readily, and he looks just as unsure as Sam does. Danny stifles laughter behind his teeth.

“No, no, it looks bad,” He takes a drag of his cigarette, shaking his head. “You can say it, I won’t get offended. It’s a fucking apartment in crime alley. Of course it looks bad.”

Sam remains silent, a rearing of her stubbornness showing itself. Tucker takes a different approach, and heaves a dramatic sigh of relief, slumping like a weight. “Okay, you’re right. It looks bad.” He frowns, “Sorry, man.”

While Danny snorts, Sam sighs. “Yeah, it looks bad. What even are those stains?” She asks, and both she and Tucker lean closer in tandem to the screen, eyes squinting at the floor behind him. Danny glances at the floor, and shrugs.

“Blood, probably.” He says, and while years in Amity Park have accustomed him to a clean environment, the desensitization of Gotham still remains. Tucker and Sam both make faces and lean away, as if the stain itself was capable of passing through to them. “Yeah, there are bullet holes in the walls.”

“Are you sure it’s safe to be there?” Tucker asks, a furrow appearing between his brows. He adjusts his glasses and leans against the chair. Sam is frowning heavily, and Danny can already see her thinking up of a new way to fix the problem.

“Oh, I never said this place was safe.” Danny tells him cheerily, taking a last hit of his cigarette before placing the dead stick onto the counter. He itches for another one. Instead he walks over to the shelf his parents brought in and starts moving it. “It’s Crime Alley, Tuck. Safe isn’t even in its vocabulary.”

Tucker and Sam look like they’ve both swallowed a lemon.

“But it’s where I want to be right now.” He says, grunting quietly when the shelf is against the wall he wants it to be, near the short hallway leading to the front door. He can push it in front of it if someone tries to break in. “And Crime Alley’s apartments are the only ones I can really afford right now without mooching off my parents, and I’d rather not depend on them.”

He can hear the disapproving hesitance from where he stands. And he ignores it.

Danny walks back into frame, lifting up a box onto the counter. He hums lightly, fingers run over the tape keeping it shut. “Why do you even want to be in Gotham, Danny?” Sam asks, and she sounds genuinely perplexed. Danny stills. “I thought this place only had bad memories for you.”

His blood turns cold, and like a dime being flipped his slow heartbeat fills his ears. “It does.” He replies automatically, before he can think. Shit, shit. He knows that Sam or Tucker would ask that question, and yet he still feels unprepared for it. His heart pulses quickly against his ribcage, knocking, asking him what he’s going to tell them that isn’t the truth.

Danny stammers, “I mean— I just— I guess I felt nostalgic.” He says, and it sounds like a weak defense. He looks away, finding himself instinctively scratching his jaw. A new tick of his when he’s nervous. From the corner of his eye, he sees Sam and Tucker both narrow their eyes at him.

He cannot tell them the real reason why he’s moved back to Gotham. He can’t tell them of the little secret and vow he told himself five years ago, the one that’s been left to fester and burn like an open wound close to his core. The one that, if he thinks too much about it, sends a searing hot electricity through him, filling him from crown to toe top-full of direst wrath.

(Danny was always the angrier one in the duo of Jason and Danny. He was always the one with glass in his mouth, cutting his teeth and tongue so that he could spit blood at the world around them. His knuckles had more blood and bruises on it than skin, once upon a time. All because he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. He has grown from it, that fury has turned to a small simmering candle.) (But sometimes, sometimes it rears its head, and electricity will buzz under Danny’s skin. There is lightning before the thunder, the second before a fist pulled to punch lands, the spark before it becomes a blaze.)

He stumbles over his words, and then sighs long and low, drooping his head. “I… was thinking that I can’t avoid this place forever.” He says, and the best lies always have the truth in it. Because it’s not a lie, not completely. But it’s not close enough to the truth either. “And that maybe if I came back, I’d be able to do something about those bad memories. Make them better or make it hurt less.”

Like wool over their eyes, it fools Sam and Tucker. Their narrowed eyes soften, and Danny feels like a snake is in his lungs as they both adopt their own versions of gentleness on their faces. “Oh, Danny.” Sam breathes out, and the snake squeezes, “Of course, we understand.”

Tucker nods, smiling at him. “Yeah, bro, that’s really brave of you. I know it can’t be easy coming back.” He says, “Maybe you can reconnect with the Waynes again, you always thought well of Mister Wayne whenever you came back from visiting.”

Danny smiles weakly, the gesture cutting into his cheeks like a knife. Perhaps he could. He was still upset with Bruce for hiding Jason’s killer from him. But he doesn’t hate him. Maybe five years ago, he did, when the death of Jason was still fresh in his mind and freshly bleeding in his heart. Now he just doesn’t know what to think of him. He was Batman. Jason was Robin, and the Joker killed Robin.

It would need to be something he’d have to speak to Bruce about in person, he thinks, in order to resolve it. To hear his judgment on it and make an opinion from there. Danny has learned in the last five years, much to Jazz’s smug delight, that talking to people about something he was upset about did make him feel better.

The conversation slips on from there into something more light, more breathable. And while they talk, Danny unpacks. He sets up his bed in the corner of the room, adjacent to the windows, and unpacks his cheap TV and table stand. It’s directly across from the couch, in front of the windows. He puts up knicks and knacks he’s collected over the years on the shelves.

When he puts up the curtains, he notices that more than one frame jiggles loosely. Sam makes a comment on the musty stains permanently dyed into the glass, and Danny talks about getting something to fix the cracks. Gotham winters can get brutal, and even if he can withstand the cold, doesn’t mean everything else in his apartment can.

“Oh, watch this.” He says halfway through unpacking, and pulls out a stick of thick white chalk from a box. “This is something I learned from Clockwork a while back; I think he knew I was going to move to Gotham.” He grins sillily, popping into the camera frame to show them. “I wonder how?”

Sam rolls her eyes, smiling while Tucker huffs. “It’s not like he’s the Master of Time and can see all past, present, and future.” Tucker snarks.

Danny hums lightly, curt like he isn’t sure he believes Tucker, and walks to a piece of bare wall not yet blocked by furniture. He starts to draw on it. The chalk shimmers with faint ectoplasm on the wall.

“Uhh…” Tucker’s voice cuts through, “Are you sure you should be doing that? Won’t you get in trouble for that?”

“There are bullet holes in the plaster, Tucker.” Danny retorts dryly, arching his hand to make a big circle. “I don’t think the landlord is gonna care if I get washable chalk on his walls.” Inside the circle, he inscribes the symbols of the Infinite Realms. “I don’t think he’d be able to see it anyways, he was really old.”

When he is done, Danny steps back to admire his work. It’s not bad, he thinks, for a lack of practice. He tosses the chalk off to the side, it lands on the couch and rolls back into the cushions. Ectoplasm heats under his hand, slowly glowing from his fingertips before stretching down the rest of his palm.

Danny’s fingers press against the wall, into the center of the circle. The result is immediate, ectoplasm is siphoned off his hand and into the circle. It glows, and then swirls. He steps off to the side for Sam and Tucker to watch its transformation. The circle fills with a swirling pool of ectoplasm, like a smaller version of the basement portal, and then it warps and stretches.

It fills out a rectangular shape, shifting like taffy being pulled this way and that, before settling into a solid shape. It solidifies, and instead of a wall there is a glowing purple door, warped in nature and seemingly shifting like a trick of the eyes. He can hear the gentle hum of the zone standing next to it, and can see the carving of the circle in the wood.

He gestures dramatically, grinning from ear to ear. “Ta-da~” He sings, “A door to my haunt! For whenever I feel like visiting it.” He pats the wood, making a strange thunk-thunk sound. “And then watch this.”

Danny touches the circle again, and the door twists and recedes like water going down a drain. The circle flashes bright green, and then fades into nothing on the wall, invisible to the naked eye. “I can hide it whenever I want! So if I ever invite someone over—” which he doubts, “—I won’t have to worry about them asking, ‘Hey Danny? Why is there a creepy fucking door in your studio apartment?’”

He gets a pair of laughs for his efforts, and Danny grins wider.

Sam and Tucker have to end the call when Danny is nearly done unpacking, leaving him alone with only his thoughts and the Gotham ambience outside. There were only a few boxes left, and they promise to call him tomorrow. He tells them that they better keep that promise.

The silence that follows after they leave feels somberly, as if the reality of moving in has finally set in and filled the air with its loneliness. With its change. Finally, Danny lets the strangeness of moving back to Gotham hit him when he reaches the last box, and he stops to take another smoke break to let it settle.

It feels so strange to be back in Gotham, he thinks. He’s all grown up, or almost grown up. He can vote and pay taxes, but he doesn’t feel much older than he was at fourteen. There’s a disconnect that makes him feel sad.

There are cars running outside, driving by. He can only catch glimpses of them, his apartment faces an alleyway. There are dogs barking in the distance, strays he bets. It’s already dark out, and he wonders if he looks out the window he would see the bat-signal shining through the night and staining the permanent cloud that hangs over Gotham.

Bruce would be so disappointed if he learned the reason for Danny’s return to Gotham. But Danny’s not here for him. He’s here for someone far more important. And like that, the simmering anger that has tucked itself into the furthest corners of his heart starts slipping through. His heart has teeth, ready to strike and snarl and bite.

He crushes the cigarette in his hand and throws it away. When he opens the last box, it is with hands that tremble and with a face of stone. With a delicateness he does not feel, he reaches in and pulls a corkboard from the box. On the corner frame is a small, near inconspicuous carving of another ghost rune.

Danny hangs it up on an empty space on the wall, out of sight from the window. It’s plain, and he has nothing to pin to it. He presses the small rune on the corner, pushing ectoplasm into it. Unlike the door, it does not twist and warp and shape itself into something new. Instead it bursts into green flame, eating away at the board and revealing the same thing underneath it, just in dark blue-black-purple.

Now this board, this board Danny has something to pin to it. The newspaper he bought earlier sits abandoned on the counter, and Danny unrolls it with something like viciousness in his chest. On the front page is an image of a damaged street, and above it is titled: “JOKER STRIKES AGAIN, 3 DEAD AND 27 INJURED”

Danny rips out the first page, he rips out every mention of him. His hands shake and threaten to crumple the paper as he turns back to the board, there is hot blood pounding in his ears. There is an impending sense of finally in his chest, like a setting sun giving the stage to a starless night. There is a stern set in his jaw, five years of festering rage rushing forth like a tidal wave, threatening to make his vision swim.

It would be so easy, he thinks, to go out as Phantom right now and hunt the clown down. It would only take a night. All it would take is a night, and then he could sink his hands into the Joker’s chest and rip out his heart where he stood. It would be so easy.

The thought alone forces Danny to stop as he is hit with another rush of fury, really making his head and vision swim. Thorny vines wrap around his throat, making it hard to breathe. He stares at a spot on the wall until the shaking passes.

If he wants to be discreet about this, then he can’t do it now. Even if he wants to. He doesn’t want witnesses. He doesn’t want an audience. He made a mistake, telling Red Hood about his plan. He wasn’t sure what he was thinking. Perhaps he wasn’t thinking at all. But he can only hope that the Hood hasn’t mentioned it to Bruce. He knows it hasn’t been long since they started working together. He hopes that the Hood has already forgotten about it.

He pins the newspaper clippings onto the black-blue-board, and stands back. It’s bare now, but it won’t be forever.

He presses the circle again, and the pinboard reverts back to its original blank state.

-----

Was I expecting to make a third part?? No. No I was not. I was also not expecting to make an entire google doc filled with summaries for short story ideas about this au that all tie into each other so that way if i DO continue this i have a skeleton pathway to follow rather than making everything up from scratch and potentially cornering myself

you can find this on ao3 or on tumblr 1 2 :)

#dp x dc #dpxdc #dp x dc crossover #danny fenton is not the ghost king #dpxdc crossover #childhood friends au #cw swearing #cw smoking #im calling them short stories bc if i call them chapters i might intimidate myself #fun fact every single chapter will have a crane wives lyric on it i am DETERMINED #i hope yall are subscribed to this on ao3 bc i almost didnt post this on tumblr #the fentons being good parents were a surprise to me too but also i never really planned on them being BAD parents #okay so they appear as negligent in the first post but we'll just call that a plothole #i had the idea that danny was the angrier one out of the duo earlier today and it felt like an epiphany #there's no guarantee of a next part but yk immm kinda hoping there is #on the docs the ending bullet point for this chapter was #'make it feel like a tv show where the seemingly inconspicuous and friendly character has something sinister up their sleeve'#WE know that danny's not inconspicuous in the least he's been thinking of this murder for the last five years. but nobody but red hood know #i had to come up with a in-story reason why danny doesnt kill the joker NOW but my out-of-story excuse is: there'd be no tension otherwise #its about the BUILD UP. Its about the RISING TENSION. Its about KNOWING that danny is planning to kill the Joker but you dont know WHEN #its about knowing that something is going to explode but never knowing when #i made the doc yesterday and spent my entire pluralism for educators class going thru the crane wives albums and looking up the lyrics and #matching them to the *checks doc* 18 short story prompts i have prepared #i am still missing one :((#its the tim and danny story and i have NOTHING PLANNED FOR THEM. i cant think of a thing for them to bond over :(( so i cant match a CW son #even DICK has a story and that was also a surprise #my favorite lines: He was always the one with glass in his mouth cutting his teeth and tongue so that he could spit blood at the world #aND danny slapping his door like a used car salesman and going 'now people wont ask why i have a creepy fucking door in my studio aptm :)'

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vic-does-battlecats · 3 months ago

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Trick or Treat(?)

Monochrome version (approximately what I was seeing while I worked)

#pov you’re splashtail #i like the idea of frostpaw getting to be intimidating #let her be unhinged. family resemblance #I NEEDED to draw creepy Curlfeather before the next book came out.#and since I also wanted to do something for Halloween And try drawing with screen color turned out this seemed a great chance to do it all #turned off*#I could still see the rgb values of the colors though (the 255 values) so I wasn’t flying completely blind #main outliers here are frostpaw didnt get the blue green eyes I like to give her #and ofc her bright gold fur and pink nails LOL #so tempted to adjust stuff after seeing it in reality but I left it as was #happy Halloween !!#frostpaw #curlfeather #Warrior cats #a starless clan #Warrior cats spoilers #a starless clan spoilers #asc spoilers #Star spoilers #wc spoilers #eyestrain #cw blood #cw gore #lemme know if that doesn’t cover it all #illustration

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neon-kazoo · 20 days ago

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A Misunderstanding

[Context: A vigilante and a villain have an arranged, cooperative deal between them. That is, until something goes wrong, much to the vigilante’s confusion. This story takes place from the POV of the vigilante, beginning in the middle of an unrelated mission/project that the villain is unaffiliated with.]

(Warnings: threats, kidnapping, gun mention, knife violence, blood, fairly descriptive cut/stab wounds, interrogation/torture, helplessness, self-harm kinda, more language than usual, sexual harassment mentioned with implied past experiences)

Note: Technically these are ocs of mine, so if you catch any unexplained details that’s where they’re from. This whole snippet was intended to develop their dynamic, but at this point it’s really just whump lol. I just realized I had over 4000 words written that would otherwise never see the light of day so I made some tweaks to post it. If I missed any name replacements you saw nothing; there was a lot of words ok?

This is extremely long and heavier than most of my snippets, so be careful!

———

“Vigilante, grab some tubes from that room down the hall. I think it’s the third door on the right.”

I left the room to grab the materials for the project. Walking down the hall I lazily counted: one…two..

I reached the third room, and I could see the PVC from the doorway. Eyes locked on the stack at the back of the room, trying to figure out how I was going to carry so many large pieces, I missed the uninvited guest lurking beside the open door, allowing him an opportunity to catch me off guard and shove me into a wall. I opened my mouth to yell for the team but my eyes processed faster than my mouth and stopped me in my tracks.

What was Villain doing here?

I must’ve looked shocked- because I was. A personal appearance from this man could mean nothing good.

I racked my brain for any reason he might have to come find me. I came up empty. I certainly didn’t remember doing anything to him worth wall-slamming me over.

The slight ease I had at identifying the familiar face disappeared when I looked closer at his expression. There was a subtle anger painted on his usually-carefully-blank features.

“I’d suggest coming quietly,” he stated in his signature effortlessly-menacing tone. He spoke easily, like he executed an impromptu abduction every Tuesday morning.

“Come where?” I questioned, immediately suspicious. What was this?

“Somewhere to answer some questions,” he replied. His words were vague. Empty. His tone suggested I wasn’t going to get anything more out of him, but I felt the urge to press.

(Why not here, why now, what was so important?)

I knew better than to argue, but I hadn’t quite grasped the gravity of my situation yet. I shifted, ready to plead that I was in the middle of something rather important, when a knife appeared at my throat, pulling me right back down to Earth.

“Or we can skip the questions.”

Questions it was.

I walked obediently when prompted and he held solidly to my arm. We exited the building via fire escape (how did he know I was here?) We reached the doors of a black SUV parked conveniently in an alley a block over from my operation. As slowly as I could manage, I worked my fingers up into my sleeve. PSAs about the odds of surviving being taken to a second location flashed in my head but were interrupted by the introduction of a gun at my side.

“Press it, and you’re dead.”

Well, fuck.

On second thought, I actually adored second locations. I dutifully climbed into the back and used my remaining energy trying to stay calm as my hands were secured to the seat and a bag placed over my head. My bracelet was, of course, removed.

I love car rides. I tried to imagine this was just another trip, it was just….dark out. At 9 in the morning. Yeah, and I had no idea where we were going. I would be trying to think of how I was gonna play this—whatever this was—but I genuinely didn’t think I had ever risked pissing Villain off. As a result, I was painfully unprepared for whatever was about to happen. I wanted to say how unnecessary this all was, that I would come willingly if asked, but something stopped me.

Fear. Something was wrong.

It was probably just a misunderstanding.

Probably.

I lost track of time and turns, instead just counting my breaths. In for four, hold for four, out for four, repeat. I successfully held my panic at bay and was able to stand on my own two feet when I was finally pulled out of the car and led to who-knows-where. I blindly shuffled all the way through somewhere to a chair in front of a table to which my ankles were secured. My hands were left free and the blinding sack was removed.

The ceiling was covered in fluorescent lights that my eyes struggled to adjust to. I dropped my gaze to the floor, which was clean white tile with a silver disk in the center. Villain stood by the door, and apparently the ride had given him enough time to re-craft his careful features back into a perfectly smooth slate. The air in the room was uncomfortably cold, enough to raise goosebumps on my arms if it weren’t for my jacket.

A proper interrogation, but for what.

“Empty your pockets onto the table.”

He was all nonchalance now, and it was extremely off-putting. He studied me closely, and I barely refrained from squirming under his gaze. In the spirit of cooperation(survival), I obeyed the order, laying out a substantial array of multi tools, first aid, gadgets, and more onto the table top. When I finished, Villain strolled over to the table, studying the items before swiping them into a bag which he settled by the door. All but a switchblade, which he left sitting closest to his side, out of my reach.

He rounded the table to my seat, gesturing for me to slide off my jacket—which he threw by the door, much to my chagrin—and kneeling to pat the rest of me down. He found nothing.

He was silent as he returned to sit in the chair opposite me across the table.

Logic told me to copy his stare and his silence, but my anger and confusion made me reckless. The urge to speak overrode my rational mind.

“Dude, what the fuck.”

Hopefully, that statement would confirm my innocence, as it was definitely designed to do. I was not at all pissed about the deliberate jacket move, or being dragged out of an important mission against my will. Humanizing myself. That’s good, right?

“What? Are you surprised your actions have consequences? Did you think I wouldn’t find out?” His voice dripped with condescension.

He placed his hand over the switchblade and I came to the sickening realization that there was a drain in the floor.

“I thought you were smarter than this, I really did.”

“What the fuck,” I repeated slowly, “are you talking about?”

He stood, and the knife was open. I ignored the blade and kept my eyes locked on his.

“I cannot defend myself if I don’t even know what you think I did.”

“You do not play dumb with me. I do not give second chances.” His voice entered a register that I had never had the misfortune of hearing before.

This was not the man I knew. This man was somehow more dangerous, and he wasn’t making sense. He wasn’t listening.

“I wonder if you keep your knives sharp,” he spoke aloud with mock curiosity, twisting and turning the tip of the blade against his fingertip. He advanced around the table and I could do nothing to stop him. This stubborn, arrogant man was about to hurt me over nothing.

I had my hands, but they could not reason with him. They could only hold tightly over his wrist as he held the knife close to my skin. Rapid acceptance flushed through my brain as reality finally registered like a heavy weight descending upon my shoulders.

If he could be stubborn, so could I.

“Fuck you, Villain.”

The tip of the blade pierced the skin of my arm and I held my mouth firmly taut. He was cutting right above where the foundation and concealer covered the tattoo on my upper arm. The leaking blood was going to ruin my careful color correcting.

Blessedly, he skipped over the rest of the upper arm and focused his efforts on my lower arm instead, which he now held in an iron grip. I hated the feeling of being grabbed but I wouldn’t show it. He did not need any more power over me.

“You’ll take a lot for that man,” he noted incorrectly as he traced down my skin with the metal.

I was at a loss.

“For who?” The pain made my words fierce. I was angry and there wasn’t anything I could do about it except let it leech into my mouth.

“I am not an idiot, [real name].” He leaned in, and fuck him.

I seethed, “Apparently, you are, since you’re spending your time cutting up someone who doesn’t know shit about what you’re on about.”

The knife plunged deep into my forearm, and I gritted my teeth hard.

“Is he worth it?” Villain taunted.

“WHO?” I demanded, still trying to guess, to figure it out before I got diced like a vegetable but the pain made my brain foggy and I just couldn’t concentrate. The knife twisted slightly, and with it brought heat and a sickening pulling sensation.

This was not what I signed up for.

The blade came up to my face, mixing blood with sweat and the salt of involuntary tears as it slid across my cheekbone.

“To think, all this time, you were just [Politician]’s bitch,” he whispered.

Affronted was an understatement, but my offense was overridden by confusion.

“Who the fuck is-“ I stopped as the gears in my brain finally started to turn, greased by the crimson dripping across my skin.

“Are you talking about that asshole counselman?”

The gears were rusty but- what was his name? CM [Olitic]? [Politi]? [Politici- Politician]! CM [Politician]. The man I blackmailed into tipping me off about low-profile cases because he couldn’t keep his hands off interns? I was getting scored like sourdough dough with my own knife for HIM?!

Villain didn’t react, just continued to drag the knife down my neck and lined it up at my collarbones. He had to cut and pull my tank top down slightly for better access.

“You’re his spy. What have you told him?” He hummed, and I took a second to gather myself despite the biting pain.

“His WHAT. Where the fuck did you get that from because let me tell you I would not kill an ant for that man let alone spy for him-”

The knife slashed over my other collarbone, and I raged.

“ARE YOU INCAPABLE OF A CIVIL CONVERSATION? LISTEN, YOU ARE WRONG. Wrong. Use your fucking words.” I wanted to spell it out. One more cut and I would be sent over the edge. “You absolute. Mother. Fucker.”

“Just a loyal. Little. Dog.”

He punctuated his dig at my supposed obedience with a hand wrapped around my throat. Possessive.

Oh, so he was trying to make me angry. I really should have seen the angle earlier because damn him it was working.

I couldn’t keep giving him the satisfaction. I took one deep breath and then another, ignoring the sting it brought up across my chest, and the restriction around my neck.

“Ask me a question, and I’ll answer it.” I looked him dead in the eyes when I continued, “or kill me and go fuck yourself.”

“What is your deal with him?”

A silent sigh of relief. Finally, something productive.

“He tips me off for counsel cases,” I explained-rather graciously might I add, given the circumstances. “He didn’t ask me to do shit for him, nor would I. I am not his personal spy. I keep the association off his back, and that is it.”

I reserved a few more choice words about his questioning techniques and waited while he absorbed my response. I sounded far more civil than I felt.

“And why would he do that for you?”

I thanked every god I knew that he seemed to finally be playing ball. Words I could work with, knives I could not.

“Blackmail,” I answered simply.

“Explain.” He raised an eyebrow, and also my knife.

“The association opened a case on him for sexual harassment. I have evidence that would prove rather unsavory for him, I hold on to it in exchange for his information. Basically, he tells me shit and I don’t bury him.” I looked to Villain expectantly. I had nothing else to say on the matter.

He tilted his head. He wanted more, or worse, he knew I had more.

My lips stayed shut.

He had a dangerous glint in his eyes when he spoke, “You don’t withhold from me.”

“Since when. That was not part of our deal.” Anger, deeper and older, burned cold inside me.

“It is now.” It was not that simple.

“I gave you enough,” I told him. I intended my words to be final. He had no right to ask anything of me anymore.

“You don’t get to decide.” Like Hell I didn’t.

“It is none of your business,” I spit back.

“I’m making it my business.” He just kept going. What I wouldn’t give to wipe that self-assuredness right out of every cell in his body.

“Cut me again and I swear you’ll never hear another word out of my mouth,” I blustered. With every fresh drop of blood, he was taking a middle finger to our entire arrangement, everything I had built.

“I highly doubt that.” He flipped the knife around in his hands. He ran his eyes along each of my new, bloody, decorative lines. Fine, maybe I was all talk. But he definitely didn’t need to know that.

“Put the knife away.” I smiled sweetly, but I was getting angry again, and I was losing the will to stop it. My self control spilled out of me in the streams of crimson blood that ran down my face and chest and arms to where it would ultimately flush down the drain and leave me defenseless. Still, that was exactly what he wanted. I couldn’t let him win.

“Or are you too scared of an equal conversation?” I challenged. Two could play at the angering game.

Unfortunately for me, Villain was focused elsewhere and didn’t take the bait. He had found a thread and he intended to pull it.

“Tell me the proof.” Impressively, he just didn’t know when to stop.

“No.” Welcome, Villain, to the hill I was willing to die on. “You cut me up for being a spy, which I’m not. I didn’t break our deal, but you just did. I owe you nothing. I will give you nothing.”

I wanted to tell him that he would never see another cooperative action out of me for as long as I lived, that he should watch his back, that he should expect to see me again soon, but I still needed to live through this and threats were definitely not in my best interests. I wouldn’t betray myself like that.

My skin burned and my arm throbbed. My heart beat aggressively against my rib cage but my adrenaline was crashing. I hurt and I was tired and I just wanted this to be over.

All that trust, and all for nothing.

Villain did not get the hint that I was done. For real this time.

When he brought the knife back, I grabbed it. I pulled it towards me to catch him off guard, sinking it inches into the flesh of my hip before ripping it from his hand and flipping the blade back towards him. He must not have thought I would do it, because he stayed close enough for me to be able to sink the blade into his stomach before he wrestled my arms under control.

A second later, I couldn’t move and I knew it was over.

“I hope it fucking hurts,” I spit coldly, blinking away my burning tears.

A flash of something–maybe surprise?– passed briefly over his face. I hoped it was fear. I needed the win. Before this all got worse.

My wrists got strapped to the chair and Villain was out the door quickly, knife still sheathed in his abdomen. I rolled my head towards the ceiling, eyes unfocused and blinking out tears. I felt satisfaction, then something darker tried to push its way to the surface.

I paid it no mind, just breathed and let it pass. That wound would not be fatal.

Exhaustion soon sent me into a state that was a pitiful excuse for rest. My head rolled forward and the burning faded into the background. I floated for an indeterminate amount of time.

The door opened, closed. A prick. I didn’t care.

I dreamt in flashes of hands and grabbing and helplessness. Fingers, digging into my arm, pressure, where there shouldn’t be-

When I awoke, I was on a cot covered in a thin layer of sweat. I was confused by the freedom of movement and the light smell of laundry detergent. I must’ve slept like a rock, because my cuts were cleaned and my forearm bandaged. I was also bundled in my freshly-clean jacket.

What on Earth-

Was this a motel?

No sooner than thirty seconds after I sat up did the door open and none other than the devil himself appear.

“I figured we’d try again,” the ghost of a grimace passed over his face as his eyes landed on me. “…differently.”

I blinked.

Unconsciousness had returned a bit of my clarity, and if I looked closely, Villain appeared…sheepish. A slight hunch, face pained like he was trying hard not to avert his eyes. Was he…remorseful?

I almost laughed at the thought, but managed to maintain a plain face.

“Uh huh,” I sounded cautiously, shaking off the last of my sleep-induced disorientation. What exactly did that mean: differently?

I gathered something had changed, but I did not voice this, knowing the man in the doorway would never bother to explain himself to me.

Instead, I added humorously, “be a shame if I didn’t believe you.”

I rubbed my eyes and smiled ruefully and he actually looked away. Villain, the original Big Scary Man, was unable to make eye contact with me. Instead, he pointed out a bathroom and said he’d be back in five minutes. The win was too good to be true.

It wasn’t until I made to slide down my waistband that I remembered the self-inflicted wound on my hip. It had also been tended to, a medium size gauze pad taped over the opening.

Now that I was once again aware of its existence, I noticed certain movements did send a shooting pain along the skin and into the fat that had been cut. I wondered how I didn’t notice it earlier. I suspected I would find stitches if I removed the patch.

Carefully pulling the elastic back over the medical tape, I stood in front of the sink, cupping my hands under the faucet and drinking until it no longer burned to swallow. Water drenched the front of my tank, but I didn’t care.

I checked my bandages and studied the open cuts in the mirror. A few had the skin held together with butterfly closures, the rest slathered in Vaseline or Neosporin. I ran my fingers gingerly along the cut on my cheek and wondered if it would scar. Keeping still had worked in my favor though, it didn’t seem too deep.

My left arm took the brunt of the damage. The rose on my upper arm was uncovered and wiped clean, and I thanked several deities it was untouched. I opened and closed my fist to make sure the hole in my forearm didn’t take out anything too important. I was no doctor, but I determined it was probably fine. Villain knew what he was doing, after all.

I studied my reflection one last time, shrugging my jacket back over my arm carefully. I took in my face, discarding the uncertainty and anger and leaving my features assured and closed. The Villain special. I walked out the door.

Villain was waiting.

He didn’t touch me, instead we walked side by side back into the room I had woken up in, which now had an apple sitting on a table to the right when we walked in. Ignoring all of it, I went straight to sit on the bed. I didn’t know what to make of his complete 180, so I drew one knee up to my chest and waited. I let a little hope trickle into my thoughts.

Maybe it just took a good stabbing to force some common sense into Villain.

He paid my refusal to sit at the table no mind and just casually tossed the apple to me after taking his own seat. The hunger I felt must have been built over many, many hours because I did not hesitate to take a bite. And another. And another. The juice dripped down my chin and I didn’t bother to catch it.

Villain respectfully waited until my more ravenous bites had passed before he spoke.

“I propose a trade.”

I just about spit out my apple. Pushing past my knee-jerk response of dignifiedly telling him to “eat shit,” I studied the man to try and determine if he was being serious. His gaze was unwavering. He seemed to be waiting for me to respond, but I wasn’t exactly in a talking mood. I felt clearer but also…off.

“Information for information,” he continued.

Wow this was a really good apple. I turned it over and studied it in my hand. A gala, maybe?

He clarified, “I want your evidence on the counselman.”

Yeah, no shit. So he does know how to use his words after all.

My apple was reduced to just a core. I supposed I had to speak sometime, lest the knife make a reappearance.

“Do you slice, dice, and drug every person you want to make a deal with, or am I just special?” I cocked my head but cast my gaze past the table towards the door.

In my peripheral, I caught his face still impassive.

“I acted on bad intel.”

Villain? Explaining himself? And I thought anger-inducing Villain was scary. Remorseful Villain was straight up terrifying. I was probably reading too far into it, just telling myself what I needed to hear, but—if I squinted—I could imagine it was an apology.

But on further evaluation, I accepted that it was all an act. Every moment I’ve spent with him carefully crafted. This was just another angle.

But what could I do about it?

Knowing didn’t make it better. The cuts were real, my fear was real, my pain was real.

In the end, I still put myself into this world, and I wasn’t going to stop.

“And what do I get out of this?” I questioned. My life? To leave? Some negotiation that would be.

“What do you want?”

Putting the ball in my court is new. Concerning. Is this a trick? How badly does he want to bury this guy?

A terrible, horrible idea hit me. I wouldn’t. I shouldn’t.

I couldn’t resist.

“Apologize.”

I stood up, walking over to the table and taking a seat, looking him dead in the eyes, and waited.

It was his turn to blink.

For what I presumed to be the first time in his life, the man in front of me had been stunned to silence.

Because of me.

Joy flooded me with the thought.

“I-“ he coughed, and I smiled with a sweetness that would send anyone without a functioning pancreas scrambling for insulin.

“My apologies,” he started, and to his credit, it didn’t sound too forced.

“For?” I pushed, and the look in his eyes suggested I was seriously pushing my luck.

I didn’t care.

“For,” he forced out, “the ‘slicing’ and ‘dicing’. The drugging, I believe, was justified.”

“You stabbed me first,” I shrugged nonchalantly, adding, “You got a pen?”

He held my gaze for a moment, before slowly getting up to retrieve a branded notepad and pen from the nightstand across the room.

He slid them towards me, and I clicked open the pen with a motion that jolted my forearm. I hid my grimace and somehow refrained from dropping the writing utensil onto the carpeting. I wrote down the number with a degree of difficulty. I pushed it towards him, but kept my fingers on it for a second.

“Wait 24, then call it.”

I could tell he wanted to ask for more details, but he wisely considered this ordeal to be over and my civility worn out.

I walked right out the door, and he didn’t stop me.

I thought about trying to get word to the team, but decided against it. I wasn’t integral to the plan. They could go on without me, and most definitely had considering the importance of the mission and the estimated time I had been gone. If they even knew I had been taken—I seemed to remember the building we were using having cameras—the chances that they would interfere in my business were limited.

So I probably had about 12 hours, give or take. Long enough for a natural nap and a rushed processing session with fuzzy pajamas and ice cream. I would have also indulged in a nice warm bath, but unfortunately I was correct about the stitches, making the whole watery adventure ill-advised.

After I had totally-effectively self-cared the whole experience away, I went out on the town.

I was making a round up City avenue when I spotted a shadow trailing behind me.

Round two, baby. Let’s go.

I stopped, and the shadow closed in.

“What kind of game are you trying to pull?” The shadow confronted angrily.

“You didn’t call the number,” I stated plainly.

“I traced it. It comes back to one [full legal name]. Do you think this is funny? We had an arrangement.” I couldn’t say why, but his words just didn’t seem as scary.

“You’re one to talk about the sanctity of arrangements. We did have one. One that you spit on. Or have you already forgotten?” I could tell he wanted to advance on me, but he was hanging back. “Speaking of which, I don’t really know when to take these stitches out.”

“So you think you can just walk away from this?”

It didn’t seem like he really believed that. It didn’t really seem like he knew what to believe.

“‘I am not an idiot’, Villain.” I threw his words back at him. It was the least he deserved. “I don’t work with people who break my trust. I made an exception. Do I need to take it back?”

He’s smarter than this, isn’t he?

He took a single step forward.

“Wow, you are thick lately. I gave you exactly what you asked for but you just can’t open your eyes and see it.”

“I didn’t ask for this,” he held the scrap of paper up in a tight fist. “I asked for evidence, and if you’re not gonna give me what I clearly asked for-”

“Put your threats away and use your brain for once. Dust off the cobwebs and whatever the fuck has you so messed up and just think.”

I wasn’t angry, just exasperated. I knew my words were entering dangerous territory, but I felt they had to be said. This was not what I was used to dealing with. A brick wall would be more reasonable.

“If I was trying to trick you, I’d give you the number of the local pizza place. If you can’t get this I can’t help you.”

A pregnant pause.

“You,” he breathed.

Finally. A connect-the-dots champion.

“Me,” I confirmed.

“Witness?”

So close.

“Victim.”

I could almost hear the click. His whole demeanor shifted, his walls building back up, self-assuredness back in place.

“I see.”

He looked me up and down one more time with newly-appraising eyes before abruptly turning around and walking away. He melted back into the darkness, disappearing without so much as another word.

Asshole.

#vigilante #villain #oh no I caused my beloved oc pain #how did that happen?#whump #defiant whumpee #intimidating whumper #miscommunication #hero/villain snippet #heroes and villains #cw torture #cw blood #cw kidnapping #essays stole all my writing power #swear im still working on that part 3 #pulled this out of the drafts #let’s be honest #half my snippets are based off these two #shhhh it’s a secret

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